Though often portrayed in scholarly literature as a spontaneous artist, Frida Kahlo worked in a quite deliberate manner, basing her paintings on diverse cultural and philosophical sources. Imaging Her Selves uncovers the unexplored visual and textual foundations of Kahlo's imagery, illustrating―through a detailed study of her diary, letters, library collection, and other material― the complex multilayered meanings of the many selves she comprised. In dozens of self-portraits, Kahlo examined the conventional and unconventional roles with which she attempted to identify. Ankori's work offers an innovative interpretation of her art as a major contribution to the ongoing human quest for a fuller understanding of the meaning of self.
Acknowledging her failure to conform to traditional female roles, such as that of wife and mother, Kahlo investigated alternative options. Her physical, metaphysical, social, and genealogical selves―including Lilith, La Llorona, La Malinche, the Crowned Nun, and the Hindu goddess Parvati― are all on display in her art. Transcending typical biographical inquiries, Ankori has created a broader study of the way in which Kahlo's art both reflected and refracted her multifaceted identity.

Imaging Her Selves: Frida Kahlo's Poetics of Identity and Fragmentation

Arts & Photography

Ankori, Gannit

History & Criticism

Praeger

Frida Kahlo stepped into the limelight in 1929 when she married Mexican muralist Diego Rivera. She was twenty-two; he was forty-three. Hailed as Rivera’s exotic young wife who “dabbles in art,” she went on to produce brilliant paintings but remained in her husband’s shadow throughout her life. Today, almost six decades after her untimely death, Kahlo’s fame rivals that of Rivera and she has gained international acclaim as a path-breaking artist and a cultural icon. Cutting through “Fridamania,” this book explores Kahlo’s life, art, and legacies, while also scrutinizing the myths, contradictions, and ambiguities that riddle her dramatic story. Gannit Ankori examines Kahlo’s early childhood, medical problems, volatile marriage, political affiliations, religious beliefs, and, most important, her unparalleled and innovative art. Based on detailed analyses of the artist’s paintings, diary, letters, photographs, medical records, and interviews, the book also assesses Kahlo’s critical impact on contemporary art and culture. Kahlo was of her time, deeply immersed in the issues that dominated the first half of the twentieth century. Yet, as this book reveals, she was also ahead of her time. Her paintings challenged social norms and broke taboos, addressing themes such as the female body, gender, cross-dressing, hybridity, identity, and trauma in ways that continue to inspire contemporary artists across the globe. Frida Kahlo is a succinct and powerful account of the life, art and legacy of this iconic artist.

Frida Kahlo (Critical Lives)

Humor & Entertainment

Reaktion Books

Turmoil and violence have defined the lives of Palestinian people over the last few decades, yet in the midst of the chaos artists live and thrive, creating little-seen work that is a powerful response to their situation. Gannit Ankori's Palestinian Art is the first in-depth English-language assessment of contemporary Palestinian art, and it offers an unprecedented and wholly original overview of this art in all its complexity. Ankori comprehensively traces the full history and development of Palestinian art, from its roots in folk art and traditional Christian and Islamic painting to the predominance of nationalistic themes and diverse media used today. Drawing on over a decade of extensive research, studio visits, and interviews, Ankori explores the vast oeuvre of prominent contemporary Palestinian artists, navigating between the personal and biographical dimensions of specific artworks and the symbolic meanings embedded within them. She provides detailed interpretations of many works and considers the complex historical, geographical, political, and cultural contexts in which the art was created. Questions of gender, exile, colonialism, postcolonialism, and hybridity are integral to Ankori's investigation as she probes the influence and thematic dominance of issues such as rootedness and displacement in Palestinian art. Palestinian Art is a fascinating introduction to a virtually unknown visual culture that has been subsumed under the torrent of current political turmoil. A groundbreaking and essential work of art scholarship, Palestinian Art illuminates new and unique facets of the Palestinian cultural identity.

Palestinian Art

This book marks the triumphant return of Frida Kahlo to San Francisco, the city where her artistic life began to unfold. Kahlo's sojourns to the United States were brief, but formative. It was in the California city--the first she visited in the US--that she ventured into a new world beyond the scope of Coyoacán, Mexico City, and Cuernavaca. Kahlo first visited San Francisco in 1930 with her husband Diego Rivera and stayed for a year while he completed murals for the City Club of San Francisco and the San Francisco Art Institute. It was love at first sight. Kahlo appreciated the beauty of the city, relished&nbsp;its ethnic diversity, and was mesmerized by neighborhoods like Chinatown. She met fascinating people, many of whom became lifelong friends. It was also in San Francisco that Kahlo began to fashion her indigenous (and now iconic) Mexican identity, deliberately distinguishing herself from the local women, whom she called "scarecrows" and "dull."&nbsp;Kahlo refined her sartorial flair, enhanced her political and social worldview, and began to paint seriously. Today she is recognized as a cultural icon, and one of the most critically acclaimed artists of the twentieth century. Presented alongside a major exhibition at the de Young museum in San Francisco, this catalogue includes essays exploring Kahlo's role as an artist and her time in San Francisco, as well as a selection of artworks by the artist and photographs of her. Frida Kahlo and San Francisco provides a unique opportunity to examine the ways in which politics, gender, trauma, and national identity influenced Kahlo's diverse modes of creativity. Exhibition Schedule <ul> <li>De Young</li> </ul> San Francisco, CA March 21-July 26, 2020 &nbsp;

Frida Kahlo and San Francisco

Henestrosa, Circe

Olcott, Hillary C.

Hirmer Publishers

Frida by Ishiuchi is the first photographic documentation ever published of Mexican artist Frida Kahlo’s personal attire and belongings, as portrayed by Japanese artist Miyako Ishiuchi. The victim of a nearly fatal bus accident as a young woman, Kahlo used fashion to channel her resulting physical difficulties into courageous statements of heritage, strength and beauty. Also focusing on the ways in which Kahlo used her iconic style to project her feminist and socialist beliefs, Ishiuchi’s color photographs transform Kahlo’s dresses, corsets, shoes, gloves, jewelry and other accessories into objects freighted with personal struggle, cultural awareness and sartorial inventiveness. Following Ishiuchi’s acclaimed series Mothers and Hiroshima, this collection provides a special look at a very intimate dimension of Frida Kahlo’s universe.

Frida by Ishiuchi

Trujillo, Hilda

Photography & Video

RM/Museo Frida Kahlo